Gauvain Soleil Noyé
Gauvain Soleil Noyé

Summary/Abstract: The stature of the character of Gauvain in the novels of Chrétiende Troyes aroused number of studies which conclude in a degradation of theimage of the hero the status of which seemed inviolable. It is not that with theCart that a collection parallel to that of Lancelot, hero of the novel, iscommitted by Gauvain who fails straightaway in the Bridge under the waterwhere he is close to the drowning and makes sorry figure. The appeal to afunctional analysis of the structure of the novel leads to identify Gauvain as thefalse hero of the wonderful tales which had analyzed Propp. This analysisheuristics clarifies the intuitions of the previous critics which saw in Gauvainan anti-hero. The "sun of the chivalry" flooded in the water of the Bridge"Évage" made so by the tale of the Cart the origin wanted by Christian of thisGauvain's downgrading among the heroes as he makes act. The Cart is thenovel-key of the evolution of the sense to be given to the chivalrous exploit aswell as to worldly courtesy in the continuity of the work of the novelistchampenois. Sense of Lancelot's adventures in the Cart is the proDrôme of thespiritual orientations of Perceval which relegate in the background the "ground"chivalries which illustrated Gauvain.

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